Mr. Chair, I cannot have my cake and eat it too. As my NDP colleague has rightly said, we should not report to the House and drop clause-by-clause consideration just because I want more information. I understand everyone's sensibilities.
I ask my colleague Mr. Bigras not to take this personally. I am a parent myself and I have been in the House for 11 years. No one here has a monopoly on the truth. Nevertheless, I am persuaded by the arguments of my colleague, Mr. Abbott. As I have said from the outset, BillC-10 is a problem for me because it has implications on the content of audiovisual productions. However, I defer to the arguments made by Mr. Abbott and by other colleagues. We can remove my "whereas" sections that refer to Bill C-327. I concur with that entirely. I can even, if he wishes, withdraw my proposals and endorse his. I have no problem with that.
If my NDP colleague wanted to propose amendments...In fact, the media themselves may have legitimate and valid concerns about the idea. We are playing with broadcast times. Parents also have a responsibility for the way in which their children watch television. I also understand that the government, with its regulatory power, has a responsibility here too.
So I defer to my colleagues' arguments. As the NDP, the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party, our duty was to study a bill for the House in its context. We have done our homework. Witnesses have appeared and people have done a fine job. The principles remain, except that as we do this study, we realize that Standing Order 97.1 can be applied. We feel that the Chair does not have to report to the House and that, in the light of everything we have done, we should stop work immediately. This is why I agree completely with the amendment. I will remove all the "whereases" that I proposed.
I would like to remind you that, at the outset, I said that, in my book, as Stan, the great coach in Les Boys might say, the motion was "be it therefore". But for reasons provided by the clerk, I came to understand that we also needed to give clear reasons to justify invoking Standing Order 97.1.
That is what I had to say, Mr. Chair.